Summer is here! And along with the nice weather is a brand new round-up of the latest mobile marketing news. So grab your iced coffee and happy reading!

Facebook pushes Place Tips, offers beacons to small businesses

This month, Facebook announced that it will be rolling out Place Tips a feature displays relevant information about a place to Facebook mobile app users who visit that location, so long as they’ve opted into sharing their location with the app. While Place Tips will promote content like posts from the business’ Page, upcoming events and friends’ recommendations and check-ins to a user’s NewsFeed, businesses also have the ability to set a custom welcome message that users will see when visiting their page. The welcome message can be general (like the example below), or can promote special offers or event happening in-store that day.

Facebook is also offering business in the US the opportunity to request a free beacon that they can use to increase reliability of the notifications. The aim is to help business increase mobile page traffic and engagement, but also convert visitors into paying customers.

Instagram announced they will also make its advertising available through an Instagram Ads API and Facebook ad buying interfaces over the coming months. This is great news for brands using Instagram and looking to improve conversions. This news comes after the company also announced they would be rolling out their carousel ad products to markets outside the US.

Pinterest previews Buyable Pins

Pinterest is making it easier for brands to convert Pinterest traffic into actual sales with buyable pins – a new pin format that will connect a user directly to a businesses commerce site, leveraging mobile payment. Pinterest is currently partnering with big brands, like Macy’s and Nordstroms, as well as eCommerce platforms like Shopify and Demandware to bring buyable pins to smaller businesses.

Twitter Introduces App Category Targeting

Now there’s a new way to target your app install ads on Twitter! This month the social media giant announced “a new tool that enables app advertisers to reach users based on the categories of apps they have installed on their device, or in which we think they have interest”. Advertisers can target users who have downloaded apps in the same or related categories, both on iOS and Android, and can track performance of category targeted campaigns with advanced app install analytics.

Facebook Video Viewers Increase, Gaining on YouTube

According to a recent survey by Ampere Analysis, Facebook is on track to deliver two trillion video views in 2015, almost 2/3 as many as the top video platform YouTube. With both Facebook and YouTube reaching a comparable number of monthly users, Ampere notes that Facebook’s user data is of significant value to advertisers, even if their video advertising products are less attractive than YouTube’s. For more, check out their infographic here.

Smartphone owners spend over 85 percent of time on native apps

A new report on mobile app usage from Forresters finds that although consumers are spending more time using apps than the mobile web, the majority of our time (84 percent) is spent on our five favorite apps. This trend also shows the dominance of leading companies in the app economy, like Facebook, Google and Amazon.

When it comes to the type of apps users are spending most time using, the Forrester’s report points to social networks, messaging and media apps as the most popular. Based on the findings Forrester advises businesses to use apps to target their most loyal or frequent customers, as they will be the ones to show high, regular usage.

Desktop shoppers outspend mobile

While mobile usage is increasing, the majority of online shoppers are still completing big ticket purchases on desktop. According to a latest study by Monetate which looked at millions of online sales transactions the average amount spent by online shoppers is significantly higher on desktop devices than it is on smartphones and tablets.

Local search is mobile!

Mobile has surpassed desktop in local search queries volumes and is set to reach 81.8 billion this year in the US. As smartphone penetration increases and usage continues to outpace desktop, local search volumes on mobile will account for search growth, reaching a predicted 141.9 billion by 2019.

More than 80% of customers prefer mobile apps to traditional websites

This is the latest finding from Urban Airship’s report “The Anatomy of A Mobile App User”. The report which looks at the demographics, behavior and preferences of app users found that smartphone users age 18 and over spend 65% more time each month using apps than they did just two years ago, with the 25 to 34 age group logging more hours per month than any other group.

Get a round-up on the most important Google I/O 2015 announcements for mobile app publishers and marketers!

User retention up in U.S, thanks to push

Localytics published the latest installment of their app retention report this month with positive app retention outlooks. For apps in the US, they found that the number of users who returned to an app eleven or more times this year increased by almost 3 percentage points to 42%.

Furthermore, they found that users who enable push are less likely to abandon an app. More than 50% of all users in North America who opt in to receive push messages return to an app regularly, with over half of all users returning to apps eleven or more times.

Security & preference for desktop top banking app concerns

According to a recent report from Comscore, 65% of the mobile population (i.e. those who own either a mobile phone or tablet) does not use their mobile device for banking activities, due to a preference of desktop (42%) and concerns over security (36%).

While mobile apps deliver substantial ROI for banks in terms of reducing branch traffic, improving customer service and increasing cross-selling, customer concerns could be better met by adopting better security features, like fingerprint scanners which show healthy adoption in the general population.

One thought on “Mobile Marketing News for June 2015”

Interesting facts have emerged, the most popular reason for not using mobile banking service is an obviously preference given to the desktop and user friendly security issues. While local search is more frequent on mobile. The most shocking thing that came out is that 80% of customers prefer mobile apps to traditional websites. That is why the focus would be on Mobile app marketing at least for the next few months.